-
Roderick Chisholm’s View of Free Will: The Causal Double Standard
The modern argument against free will is often built on the impressive, clockwork logic of determinism. It suggests that every event in the universe is the necessary result of the events that came before it, governed by the immutable laws of physics. If we trace the “cause” of a human action back through neurological impulses,…
-
From Sun to Shadow: How Plato’s Academy Embraced the Void
The image most people have of Platonism is one of radiant, almost blinding certainty. If you’ve ever sat through a philosophy 101 lecture, you likely remember the “Allegory of the Cave.” Plato describes a journey out of the darkness of opinion and into the light of the Sun—the Form of the Good. For Plato, the…
-
Functionalism and the Software of the Mind
In our previous look at Daniel Dennett’s work, we explored the “how” of consciousness—how evolution could move from mindless bacteria to the complex symphonies of Bach through the slow accumulation of “competence without comprehension.” But if Dennett is right—if we are truly biological machines—we are left with a staggering conceptual hurdle. If the mind is…